Abstract

The Sevier River Water Users Association (Association), StoneFly Technology (StoneFly), Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation), and Utah State University (USU) are working to create a virtual watershed, an accurate real-time representation of the Sevier River watershed displayed on the Internet (www.sevierriver.org). This, coupled with low-cost automatic remote-control on all major structures, makes for near instantaneous decision making. The ability to see what is happening throughout the watershed and to react promptly to changing hydrologic and weather conditions has made for consistent improvements in the way the river and irrigation canals are operated. Despite these significant gains, the Association has only scratched the surface of their web site's potential.

KEY TERMS: watershed, Internet, web site, real-time information, low-cost canal automation